Zed's Ethiopian, 1201 28th Street, NW Washington DC 20007
Georgetown
By: Julie Cantor
One need not be convinced by the pictures of full-tummied DC
celebrities on the wall – the food and fun at Zed's will speak for
itself. Along with a buddy – it is Ethiopian custom to never eat alone
– I relinquished utensils for an evening of picking up bites from a
delightful array of dishes only with a piece of injera, flatbread made
with buckwheat flour. While I had read extensively about this
tradition of Ethiopian cuisine prior to my visit, I was still a little
bit uneasy about the prospect of embarrassing myself with
uncontrollable messiness. I bring a change of shirt even to
restaurants that allow the use of a knife and fork, so I braced myself
for the worst. Pleasantly, it turned out that using the injera to pick
up food was not messy at all! I got to wear the shirt I wore there all
the way home!
As for the food, I had been looking for something to get me out of a
Chinese-Italian-Sushi rut, and Zed's certainly delivered. We started
with Shrimp Tibbs, a dish of marinated shrimp, onion, garlic, and
tomatoes, which was tender and bursting with Ethiopian food's
signature flavors, cumin, basil, and coriander. For a main course, we
shared Zed's Combination Vegetarian Entree Sampler, which included an
Ethiopian Harvest Vegetable Specialty of Cauliflower, Carrots and
Greenbeans, Yellow Split Pea and Red Lentil Purees, and Collard
Greens. As someone who once had a nightmare about lentil soup and who
hadn't ever tried most of the vegetables in the sampler, I had a
little bit of post-orderers remorse; however, all of my fears were put
aside when the food arrived. I enjoyed the entire thing, right down to
the last bold, spicy, tasty red lentil. Completely stuffed, we had to
refuse dessert, but decided to come back again soon, and to share the
experience with a big group of friends next time!
Georgetown
By: Julie Cantor
One need not be convinced by the pictures of full-tummied DC
celebrities on the wall – the food and fun at Zed's will speak for
itself. Along with a buddy – it is Ethiopian custom to never eat alone
– I relinquished utensils for an evening of picking up bites from a
delightful array of dishes only with a piece of injera, flatbread made
with buckwheat flour. While I had read extensively about this
tradition of Ethiopian cuisine prior to my visit, I was still a little
bit uneasy about the prospect of embarrassing myself with
uncontrollable messiness. I bring a change of shirt even to
restaurants that allow the use of a knife and fork, so I braced myself
for the worst. Pleasantly, it turned out that using the injera to pick
up food was not messy at all! I got to wear the shirt I wore there all
the way home!
As for the food, I had been looking for something to get me out of a
Chinese-Italian-Sushi rut, and Zed's certainly delivered. We started
with Shrimp Tibbs, a dish of marinated shrimp, onion, garlic, and
tomatoes, which was tender and bursting with Ethiopian food's
signature flavors, cumin, basil, and coriander. For a main course, we
shared Zed's Combination Vegetarian Entree Sampler, which included an
Ethiopian Harvest Vegetable Specialty of Cauliflower, Carrots and
Greenbeans, Yellow Split Pea and Red Lentil Purees, and Collard
Greens. As someone who once had a nightmare about lentil soup and who
hadn't ever tried most of the vegetables in the sampler, I had a
little bit of post-orderers remorse; however, all of my fears were put
aside when the food arrived. I enjoyed the entire thing, right down to
the last bold, spicy, tasty red lentil. Completely stuffed, we had to
refuse dessert, but decided to come back again soon, and to share the
experience with a big group of friends next time!
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